Balinese Hinduism in the context of "Bali"

The Balinese (Balinese: ᬳᬦᬓ᭄‌ᬩᬮᬶ, romanized: Anak Bali (in the ketah register), ᬯᭀᬂᬩᬮᬶ, Wong Bali (in the madia register), ᬓ᭄ᬭᬫᬩᬮᬶ, Krama Bali (in the singgih register); Indonesian: Orang Bali) are an Austronesian ethnic group native to the Indonesian island of Bali and the surrounding islands. The Balinese population of 4.2 million (1.7% of Indonesia's population) live mostly on the island of Bali, making up 85% of the island's population. The Balinese are distinctive amongst the ethnic groups of Indonesia for their adherence to Balinese Hinduism rather than Abrahamic religions such as Islam or Christianity.

There are also significant populations on the island of Lombok and in the easternmost regions of Java (e.g. the regency of Banyuwangi), most of them are descendants of Balinese since the kingdoms era who once controlled the region. Some Balinese can also be found in Balinese migrant areas such as Lampung and Sulawesi regions, mainly due to the migration following the eruption of Mount Agung in 1963 as well as the transmigration program enacted by the Indonesian government.

The transmigration program (Indonesian: transmigrasi, from Dutch, transmigratie) was an initiative of the Dutch colonial government and later continued by the Indonesian government to move landless people from densely populated areas of Indonesia to less populous areas of the country. This involved moving people permanently from the island of Java, but also to a lesser extent from Bali and Madura to less densely populated areas including Kalimantan, Sumatra, Sulawesi, Maluku and Papua. The program is currently coordinated by Ministry of Transmigration.

The stated purpose of this program was to reduce the considerable poverty and overpopulation on Java, to provide opportunities for hard-working poor people, and to provide a workforce to utilize better the natural resources of the outer islands. The program, however, has been controversial as fears from native populations of "Javanization" and "Islamization" have strengthened separatist movements and communal violence. The incomers are mostly Madurese and Javanese but also from other populated areas such as Hindu Balinese.

The Kingdomship of Bali (Balinese: ᭚ᬓᭂᬭᬚ᭡ᬦ᭄ᬩᬮᬶ; romanized: Kĕrajaan Bali) was a series of Hindu-Buddhist kingdoms that once ruled some parts of the volcanic island of Bali, in Lesser Sunda Islands, Indonesia. With a history of native Balinese kingship spanning from the early 10th to early 20th centuries, Balinese kingdoms demonstrated sophisticated Balinese court culture where native elements of spirit and ancestral reverence combined with Hindu influences—adopted from India through ancient Java intermediary—flourished, enriched and shaped Balinese culture.

Because of its proximity and close cultural relations with the neighbouring island of Java during the Indonesian Hindu-Buddhist period, the history of the Bali Kingdom was often intertwined with and heavily influenced by its Javanese counterparts, from Mataram (c. 9th century) to the Majapahit empire in the 13th to 15th centuries. The culture, language, arts and architecture of the island was influenced by Java. Javanese influences and presences grew even stronger with the fall of the Majapahit empire in the late 15th century. After the empire fell to its Muslim vassal the Demak Sultanate, a number of Hindu Majapahit courtiers, nobles, priests, and artisans found refuge on the island of Bali. As a result, Bali became what historian Ramesh Chandra Majumdar describes as the last stronghold of Indo-Javanese culture and civilisation. The Bali Kingdom in the following centuries expanded its influence to neighboring islands and began to establish colonies; Gelgel Kingdom Bali, for example, expanded their influence and established a colony in the Blambangan region at the eastern tip of Java to the western part of the Sumbawa island, while Karangasem Kingdom established their colonial settlements in western parts of Lombok, and the Klungkung kingdom conquered Nusa Penida in a later period.

Ç or ç (C-cedilla) is a Latin script letter used in the Albanian, Azerbaijani, Manx, Tatar, Turkish, Turkmen, Kurdish, Kazakh, and Romance alphabets. Romance languages that use this letter include Catalan, French, Portuguese, and Occitan, as a variant of the letter C with a cedilla. It is also occasionally used in Crimean Tatar and in Tajik (when written in the Latin script) to represent the /d͡ʒ/ sound. It is rarely used in Balinese, usually only in the word "Çaka" during Nyepi, one of the Balinese Hinduism holidays. It is often retained in the spelling of loanwords from any of these languages in English, Basque, Dutch, Spanish and other languages using the Latin alphabet.

It was first used for the sound of the voiceless alveolar affricate /t͡s/ in Old Spanish and stems from the Visigothic form of the letter z (Ꝣ). The phoneme originated in Vulgar Latin from the palatalization of the plosives /t/ and /k/ in some conditions. Later, /t͡s/ changed into /s/ in many Romance languages and dialects. Spanish has not used the symbol since an orthographic reform in the 18th century (which replaced ç with the z, which has now been devoiced into /θ/ or /s/), but it was adopted for writing other languages.

Melasti is a Hindu Balinese purification ceremony and ritual, which, according to the Balinese calendar, is held several days prior to the Nyepi holy day. It is observed by Hindus in Indonesia, especially in Bali. Melasti was meant as the ritual to cleanse the world from all the filth of sin and bad karma through the symbolic act of acquiring the Tirta Amerta, "the water of life".

The Melasti ceremony is held on the edge of the beach to purify oneself of all the bad things in the past and throw them into the ocean. In Hindu belief, water sources such as lakes and seawater, are considered the source of life (Tirta Amrita). In addition to performing prayers, during the Melasti ceremony, all sacred objects which belong to a temple, such as pralingga or pratima of Lord Ida Sanghyang Widi Wasa, and all of the sacred equipment, are cleaned and purified.